Traffic surveillance systems are old and well-known throughout the art. For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 4,591,823 (the U.S. Pat. No. '823), the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.
The U.S. Pat. No. '823 discloses a traffic speed surveillance system including a set of monitor transceivers located along a roadway and communicating with a central processor. A vehicle transceiver is mounted in a vehicle and includes means for entering driver identification and vehicle identification, and a speedometer for measuring the speed of the vehicle. The vehicle transceiver receives radio signals from a monitor transceiver indicative of speed limit and compares measured speed against the limit, and sends radio signals indicative of driver identification, vehicle identification, and speed limit violation to the monitor in the transceiver for reporting to the central processor.
Unfortunately, the traffic surveillance system of U.S. Pat. No. 4,591,823 suffers from at least the following problems. In the system of the U.S. Pat. No. '823, there is a need for an extraordinarily high number of monitor transceivers to be located along roadways all around the country or globe. Such a high number of transceiver monitors is expensive, burdensome, and susceptible to vandalism and damage. Such devices are also aesthetically unattractive. It would be nearly impossible to provide all roadways across the country or globe with monitor transceivers, as this would be both impractical and unduly expensive.
In view of the above, it will be apparent to those of skill in the art that there exists a need in the art for an improved traffic violation surveillance system that does not require monitor devices to be positioned along each and every roadway to be monitored. Such a system should be both cost effective and efficient.
It is the purpose of this invention to fulfill the above-described needs in the art, as well as other needs in the art which will become more apparent to the skilled artisan once given the following disclosure.